Announcing you hosted a party that you invited some people to but not your entire friendly audience you are announcing to is classic bad manners. It just is. Facebook is not a separate world, its part of the regular everyday world. And its bad manners to tell a casual friend "oh yeah I hosted this great party just the other day, you weren't invited but several other people were, let me tell you about it..."

I've understood the rule as that it is not rude to mention a party to somebody who had no reasonable expectation of being invited - i.e. it is not rude to mention a family-only party to a coworker, because they'd have no reason to expect an invitation. Nor is it rude to mention a local party to international friends, because they wouldn't expect an invitation either.

So to me the rudeness of both the FB announcement and the comment depends on how close the person commenting was to the bride.

But of course, if I had been the bride and received such a comment, my immediate reaction would be to assume that she was joking. Sort of like, "Ooooh, you're going on a cruise? Can I fit into your suitcase?".

To be honest I don't believe in the idea that Facebook is not a real realm of life, and that normal manners are suspended. It is, and always has been, rude to discuss parties you host publicly to a wide audience among friends when many of those friends were not invited.

I have mentioned in conversation to people that I am married, but I don't [socially] bring up my wedding to people who were not invited. While I think the commenter was rude to call out the bride publicly, I think her sentiment was pretty spot on.

I don't think this falls under discussing a party who others would not be invited to. This woman was announcing her marriage on a fairly public forum that we have 'friends' who we may never meet IRL, and someone demanded to know why they weren't invited. That could have been done on PM. Yes, it is rude to discuss parties around friends and family who are not invited, but not everyone can assume they are invited to weddings. I have had people talk about their weddings around me, weddings I have not been invited to, and it didn't bother me unless I was invited to a shower but not the wedding because that seemed gift grabby.

Well no. The bride didn't just announce her marriage. She also announced she had a surprise garden party with guests.I think its perfectly reasonable to announce one got married, especially if its been a change in the date of when the marriage was planned for. But that's not all this bride did. She also announced she had a party that she invited some people too, and she announced it to people she didn't invite.

It absolutely is bad manners if that's what she did, but reading the OP I'm not sure. OP, did the bride talk about the party itself on her FB (as opposed to just, say, posting that she got married or changing her relationship status)? Or did you know about the party by other means, like a mutual friend telling you about it?

OP here. The party wasn't mentioned on fb beforehand. The announcement was a fb life event (married y) and was posted after the party (later the same day). A couple of pics of the happy couple were included.

One of the guests posted a pic tagging the happy couple *before* the bride or groom made any fb announcement. He mentioned that he'd gone expecting a garden party and ended up at a wedding. It showed up in my newsfeed and presumably that of her other fb friends.

OP here. The party wasn't mentioned on fb beforehand. The announcement was a fb life event (married y) and was posted after the party (later the same day). A couple of pics of the happy couple were included.

One of the guests posted a pic tagging the happy couple *before* the bride or groom made any fb announcement. He mentioned that he'd gone expecting a garden party and ended up at a wedding. It showed up in my newsfeed and presumably that of her other fb friends.

Hope that helps.

Then I can't call the couple rude. They just announced their marriage, which is normal. The pics were only of them and didn't reveal a party; it could have been just them in their backyard after going to the JOP, for all anyone knew. The oops was by the guest who spilled the beans (and he also oopsed by scooping their announcement).

OP, are you certain the poster who expressed dismay at not being invited wasn't kidding?

I got married with out telling anyone and then just changed my relationship status to married on facebook and one of my best friends on the planet commented

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I give it two weeks.

No smiley, no winky face, what ever. I laughed out loud. Deadpan humor comes across wonderfully online sometimes.

If it wasn't for the frowny face I'd give the poster some leeway. I think there is a fine line between humor and making it all about them.

Exactly. Jokes are a know-your-audience thing. If you have to explain it or make it clear why it was a joke and not something less kind, then it wasn't appropriate to make in the first place. Plus, online, a lot of other people can see your joke, so while the person you intended it for might laugh, other people might not think particularly well of you.

OP, are you certain the poster who expressed dismay at not being invited wasn't kidding?

I got married with out telling anyone and then just changed my relationship status to married on facebook and one of my best friends on the planet commented

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I give it two weeks.

No smiley, no winky face, what ever. I laughed out loud. Deadpan humor comes across wonderfully online sometimes.

Hi Ilrag, I certainly didn't read it as a joke. There's nothing in the comments to suggest it was - like an added congrats, or a lighthearted reply from the bride.

Your friend sounds like she has a great sense of humour & someone who knows you well enough to make that sort of joke.

Online stuff can be a bit tricky to read - tone does not always come thru as well as it might in person. That's why i prefer to use an emoticon (or saying #joke or whatever) to avoid misunderstandings.

Also, it's not a private conversation on fb - lots of people have fb friends who don't know background/context or poster so well. They may not get it & may (unjustly in the case you mention) develop a negative impression of the poster. It's really a know-your-audience sort of thing, which can be harder on fb than IRL (where you have a fair idea whether Great Aunt Mildred or the mother of the groom are in earshot).

It's really fascinating to see how people interact on line vs in real life. Loved the other threads about fb vs irl snooping too - so many different perspectives on it. One of the reasons I enjoy reading Ehell so much.

& also wanted to say thanks to everyone who posted so far. & a couple more posted while I was typing this.

My sister-in-law (husband's brother's wife) has a lot of family that make remarks like this on her Facebook page. For example, she announced that she was pregnant really early (like, at 4 weeks along) and they all commented things like "This is way too early to tell anyone, hope it survives...." And then when she only responded to people's comments of congratulations, and not those awful ones, they posted, for example, "How come you didn't respond to me, huh, I'm only saying what everyone's thinking...."

Needless to say, she has adopted a policy of simply ignoring and deleting such comments because nothing good will come of engaging them.

My sister-in-law (husband's brother's wife) has a lot of family that make remarks like this on her Facebook page. For example, she announced that she was pregnant really early (like, at 4 weeks along) and they all commented things like "This is way too early to tell anyone, hope it survives...." And then when she only responded to people's comments of congratulations, and not those awful ones, they posted, for example, "How come you didn't respond to me, huh, I'm only saying what everyone's thinking...."

Needless to say, she has adopted a policy of simply ignoring and deleting such comments because nothing good will come of engaging them.

Your sister-in-law has a very sensible way of dealing with those comments. Who says something like that? Seriously?

The notion that it is rude to post about social events because someone might be unhappy that they weren't invited is wrong, IMO. No one is entitled to an invitation to anything, especially not a wedding. Perhaps some people here are only FB friends with their closest IRL friends, but I also use my FB page for professional networking, so I have many FB friends who are really professional acquaintances who would never expect to be invited to an event of mine like a wedding. The cranky commenter's post didn't even make sense - she wouldn't have been invited to the destination wedding, so it's not clear why she would expect an invitation. It sounded to me like she was saying "I was looking forward to your wedding in fiji!" which wasn't going to happen anyway.

The notion that it is rude to post about social events because someone might be unhappy that they weren't invited is wrong, IMO.

I agree. As adults we should be able to handle the reality that our friends have other friends and lives that exist without our presence. I think people should fill their days with activities that make them happy and not be concerned with what other people might be doing - what other people are doing is not about you!

The notion that it is rude to post about social events because someone might be unhappy that they weren't invited is wrong, IMO.

I agree. As adults we should be able to handle the reality that our friends have other friends and lives that exist without our presence. I think people should fill their days with activities that make them happy and not be concerned with what other people might be doing - what other people are doing is not about you!

Especially getting married, of all things! I can see that sometimes it is appropriate to not talk about an event to someone who wasn't invited so as not to upset them, but does that mean that you can't ever let slip that you're married to anyone except the fifty or so people who came to your wedding? Venues aren't infinite, either, nor are they free--no-one can invite everyone. What about if you have a baby--you can't even mention that you have offspring to people who weren't at the baby shower or announcement party or whatever?